I will share the story of Jean-Louis.
Cue the Wheel of Pain montage.
Which is how Jean-Louis became the youngest fencer ever to pass the exam for maitre d'armes.
Jean-Louis eschewed both approaches for simplicity.
As you might imagine, Jean-Louis fought in public demonstrations a lot.
The man continued to heckle. Jean-Louis asked if he was talking about him. The man allowed as how he was.
Jean-Louis asked him if he meant to force a duel.
To which Jean-Louis said, "Okay."
They would fight the next day. The heckler would have his sword.
Jean-Louis would use a blunt foil.
Jean-Louis, with a foil against a sword, parried every attack, wore his man down... and then lashed the heckler across the face with the *edge* of the foil.
Laying his face wide open, scarring him for life.
...because neither facing a sword armed only with a foil, nor fighting in 30 battles under Napoleon Bonaparte, were Jean-Louis's most badass moment.
This was:
There was a massive drunken brawl between the 32d Regiment and the 1st Regiment, who were Italians.
And what the French army decided on was the wildest scheme ever heard outside of a 1970s martial-arts film.
They would hold... A FENCING TOURNAMENT.
Each regiment would provide 15 champions. One would win all.
Oh no.
In this tournament, a man fought until he was wounded or killed.
IN A ROW.
French fencing was mechanical, logical, formalistic. Italian fencing, as the French stereotype had it, was rowdy, passionate -- and dedicated to the kill.
They faced each other shirtless -- no possibility of armor, nothing to brush aside a thrust.
Their first exchange was lengthy, and Jean-Louis wounded Ferrari.
In the second exchange, he killed him.
The bad news: *now all of them wanted revenge.*
The third man dropped unconscious after Jean-Louis stabbed him in the chest.
And the fourth...
And the fifth...
And the sixth...
Every single Italian has been killed or maimed or disabled or otherwise manhandled by Jean-Louis.
Except two, whom Kirchner describes as "pale but resolved" as they awaited their turn in the meat grinder.
COLONEL. "You've defended the regiment's honor. And your comrades' honor. And my honor. But you have fought *thirteen duels for your life* in a row, and I can't in good conscience ask for more."
Jean-Louis insisted, no, look, I've *got this.*
And he made, uncharacteristically for Jean-Louis, a flourish.
Which cut his friend slightly on the leg.
THE COLONEL. "WELL CLEARLY THIS IS OBVIOUSLY AN OMEN AND YOU SHOULD LISTEN TO ME RIGHT NOW, YOU TRUST MY JUDGMENT IN HONOR DON'T YOU"
Jean-Louis dropped his sword, and went to the Italians, and clasped their hands.
"Vive Jean-Louis!"
"Vive the 32d Regiment!"
"Vive the First! We are but one family! Vive l'armee!"
And they were one again.
He married and had a daughter (whom he trained, and whom Kirchner reports became "the most celebrated swordswoman of her time," though he annoyingly doesn't report what her name was). She married nobility.
And there you have a story of bad-assery.
/fin